Daisy Chain
by afrozenheart412
Summary: A surprising Mother's Day gift that brings joy to a loving family. 1/7


_"Mother is the name for God on the lips and hearts of all children." Eric Draven, The Crow._

I've always loved that quote and thought it to be the wisest thing I've ever heard.

Happy Mother's Day, everyone! *hugs*

Disclaimer: I don't and will never own any rights or privileges that belong to CSI NY.

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><p><em>Sitting in a wheat field on a warm <em>_Montana __day, a woman wearing a white summer dress lazily rocks back and forth on the ground while holding her little girl. Her husband dozing by their side after their picnic, his gray cowboy hat covering his eyes. Running her fingers through her daughter's hair watching the clouds float by, the woman looks down and notices a ladybug one of the daisy petals. As it climbs onto her finger, she holds the black speckled bug underneath her daughters nose. _

_"Look at this, she wants you to make a wish," the woman tells her daughter. The child's eyes grow big with thoughts of what she should wish for, when it hits her. _

_"I want to be like you, Mommy," the girl smiles up from beneath her mop of wavy brown hair the daisy chain falling over one eye. Pushing it back she leans up to gently blow the ladybug away, a tradition that was taught to her by her mama. _

_Watching as the bug flies off, the woman with misty eyes hugs the child causing her to laugh wildly. "That's my girl," she murmurs kissing her rosy cheek. _

_"Mom, I have to go now," her daughter says pulling out of her embrace to run in the field, darting in and out of the wheat._  
><em><br>"No, just a few more minutes," she calls out trying to bring her back but its too late, the girl is out of reach and running faster than Grace could keep up. _

_"Girl, come back here," Grace cries running faster after the little girl. But as fast as she runs, she can't quite catch up to the disappearing child. _"Lindsay!"

"Grace?"

"Grace."

"Grace?" Loch shakes her gently but firmly leaning over her from his side of the bed, "Thalia get up!"

"What? What's wrong?" She murmurs, her throat scratchy from sleep. "Are you okay?"

"That should be my question," he replies running his aged hand over her short gray hair smoothing out the tangles. "You were having a nightmare, Thalia."

"Using my name instead of my nickname, Loch?" She tries to bluff her way out of it with a fake smile, finally sighing when he silently looks right through her waiting for the real answer. "It was nothing...just a memory of when we used to take those picnics out in the fields with Lindsay as a girl. I miss those days...they flew by so fast."

"Maybe this will help," he tells her putting down his cell phone and getting out of bed. In the darkness, Lochlyn moves around to her side of the bed and grasps her hands to pull her gently out of bed. Not forgetting her reading glasses, he picks them up from the nightstand as he leads them both down the hall to the stairs. Walking down the old creaky steps to their home office, Lochlyn flicks the on button waiting while the computer boots up.

"What are we doing? It's three in the morning, we have to get up in an hour to start our day," she grumbles putting her glasses on squinting at the brightness of the monitor in the dark. Not knowing why they are sitting in front of the computer when they could be taking advantage of that one last hour before their morning chores start.

"Be patient, my grace," her husband smiles threading his fingers through his white hair trying to wake up himself. "I think you'll enjoy this surprise." Selecting GMail on his Bookmarks and signing in, Lochlyn moves the mouse and opens a message that was alerted to him only five minutes before via text message.

_To: __L&TMonroe_  
><em>From: DMesser<em>  
><em>Subject: Lucy Messer<em>  
><em>Attachments: Lucy<br>_

_Dear Lochlyn and Grace,_

_I know that you don't know me all that well, but I wanted to tell you that Lindsay gave birth to a beautifully, healthy, and loud baby girl! Mother and daughter are doing excellent, and I couldn't be prouder of them. :D_

_No matter how you may feel about me, know that I love your daughter and what she has given me are gifts that I would willingly give my life for. I understand that both of you still have some unresolved feelings about our wedding, but I wanted you to have some pictures of the newest addition to our family. Lucy is a knockout...she has her mother's determined little chin. :D_

_Attached is an MP3 of her first cry, a friend of ours who works with us helped me set it up when I arrived at the hospital. Can you believe it? Montana couldn't even wait for me to drive her to the hospital, LOL. Well, that's all for now. I just wanted to let you know, Grandpa and Grandma. _

_Call us day or night, the number to our room at the hospital is 212-555-0412._

_Danny_

"Oh god," Grace breathes as the tears run down her face looking at the pictures their son-in-law sent them. Lindsay, exhausted yet glowing, holding baby Lucy with Danny's arms around them both. His eyes filled with love smiling into the camera. "My baby, my baby is a mother. Play the MP3, Loch."

Surreptitiously wiping at his own eyes, Lochlyn clicks on the attachment and plays it. As the baby's cry echoes around the darkened room, the grandparents hold each other celebrating the next generation's first breath while sadly mourning the loss, knowing that their daughter is no longer a child who needs them to help her tie her shoes. Or a young woman who begged to borrow the keys to the truck to go have fun with her friends, but a woman starting her own family.

Sniffing back tears, Grace reaches over to the mouse and covers her husband's hand, weaving her fingers together with his. She brings them to her heart, and looks into his eyes. "Maybe this summer they'll have time enough to visit? We could share our family picnics with Lucy and Danny, won't that be fun?"

"Yeah, it will. You and Lindsay could teach her how to make a daisy chain, like your mother taught you," he says cupping her cheeks with his hands. Wiping the tears from her face with his thumbs, he brings her face to his softly kissing her with all of the love he has in him. After coming up for air, Lochlyn gets up from the computer chair his knees creaking as he slowly walks to the door before pausing. "Are you coming back to bed, Grace?"

"Not just yet, my love. I've something to do first." She waves him out the door listening to him moving up the stairs, hitting the creaky step, she makes sure she is alone before grabbing the phone. Dialing the numbers, she waits as it rings, rings, and rings. About to give up hope, it is picked up on the other end.

"Hello," Lindsay groggily answers pushing back a sweaty strand of hair with the hand holding the receiver, biting back a moan from her achy body. Glancing down at Lucy to make sure her moan didn't disturb her feeding, Lindsay smiles and looks across the room to the couch where Danny sprawled on his back snoring. "Hello?"

"Lindsay, it's your Mom. Your Dad and I saw the pictures that Danny sent. She is so beautiful, just like you when you were born, my girl. We're so proud of you!" Her voice trembles before breaking into sobs.

Lindsay, listening to her mother's sobs, weepy as well. "It's the best thing I could think of to give you, Happy Mother's Day, Mom."

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><p>I want to thank you all for reading, even though this has to be the fluffiest and most sappiest thing I've written so far. This is also due to the fact that two weeks ago Thursday, my sister and her husband themselves received new titles...Mommy and Daddy! So that makes our parents Oma and Opa, and me...Tante. :)<p>

So I want to apologize to everyone out there, most especially Lily, for not being able to get back to my PMs or Emails lately. With my mom having a hard time accepting life without her mom, and my sister becoming one herself, its all that I can do to find some free time to myself. I also didn't know the length to which my sister would go to beat my mom out of her record of 48 hours of labor with me, to hold out for 49 before telling the doctor she was done and wanted him out NOW! I love that I can laugh about that, and she totally hates me for it, LOL.

...and for those of you who have read Hiding, yes, I'm a hypocrite. As always, thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed this. I'm an Auntie! :D


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